The Park Down the Street
by Black Fire Ryu
Summary: Playing by yourself isn't very fun, but that's what making new friends is for. [Happy AkuRoku Day!] [Complete]


**Disclaimer: **I don't own Kingdom Hearts. Believe me, that's probably a good thing.

**Author's Notes: **It's AkuRoku Day, and I felt the urge to write something. It's a drabble, so I hope you're not here looking for a long read.

**Warnings:** Little kids being cute. Is that worthy of a warning?

**Special Thanks To:** My little brother for being awesome and turning a year old yesterday.

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It was hot. The sun shone brightly, heating up the pavement and playground equipment to the point where it looked as though it could melt. No wind was present, and there wasn't a single cloud in the sky. Trees and grass looked more brown than green in the heat of late summer. Parents very reluctantly took their children to parks and pools, knowing that they would need to be treated for sunburn later in the evening. Teenagers clung to malls like bees clung to flowers, relishing the air conditioning provided therein. 

On a day when the cement of the sidewalk was almost hot enough to fry an egg, one certain older brother decided to take his younger brother to the small park down the street. The little boy had wanted to go and was willing enough to put up his toys in order to accompany his big brother. Neither was quite old enough to go somewhere by himself, but the park was only a block away and the neighborhood was nice enough. If one were to get hurt, the other could easily run home to get Mom or Dad.

The older brother had every intention to spend the day playing with his younger brother, but when a certain silver-haired friend appeared, he was easily distracted. The brunet left the blond alone on the swings with a promise of being back in a minute, then ran off to see whether he or his friend could climb the tallest tree fastest. The little boy didn't really mind swinging alone. He was only five-and-a-half, he needn't worry about climbing trees just yet.

A minute passed, then two, and then five. Another thirty came and went quickly after that, and before he knew it an hour had passed. Being very much annoyed with his space cadet of and older brother, the blond got up to go play in the sand pit. The swings were boring, anyway. Who wanted to swing back and forth, back and forth all day long? Flinging sand around in a hole was much more entertaining.

The blond kicked off his shoes and hiked up his shorts, running quickly across the blistering sand before sitting down on one of the little imitation construction-site shovels. He pulled the little levers, biting his lip as he attempted to move it without setting his little feet down in the sand.

"Hi."

The blond jumped, dropping the lever and spilling the sand back into the hole. He frowned, then looked up at the one who had distracted (not frightened!) him so.

The other little boy waved, grinning. Messy red hair framed a pale but sunburned face while green eyes twinkled with mischief. This boy was one of the older ones. Even older than the blond's big brother. He had to be at least nine! The little blond boy looked away shyly, pulling at the levers of the shovel once more. He had to look cool in front of a big kid. Acting childish simply wouldn't do.

"Hi," he responded at last, moving the sand around a little.

"What's yer name?" the big kid asked, kicking off his own shoes and hopping across the sand. He took a seat at the shovel beside the little boy's, balancing his feet precariously on the bars of the levers to keep them off of the hot sand.

"Roxas," he said quietly, blue eyes meeting green ones for a moment.

"My name's Axel. Remember that," the other responded, grinning cheekily. Roxas nodded, smiling back. This kid was weird. Oh, well. Most older kids were. It was to be expected. Axel glanced down toward the small hole Roxas had made, looking thoughtful. "What'cha doing?"

"I dunno. Making a hole," the blond murmured, hanging his feet down to kick at the sand with the tips of his toes.

"Well, duh. Why?"

"I'm bored."

The red head laughed. Roxas frowned at him, not wanting to be made fun of, but Axel smiled back. "You wanna go play on the monkey bars?" he asked.

"I don't know how," Roxas said quietly, looking down. So much for his cool image. All of the older kids knew how to do that, but he couldn't quite reach the bars yet.

"Don't know how? I'll teach ya, then." Axel jumped off of his seat, dancing back across the sand to his shoes. When Roxas didn't move, he frowned at him. "You don't wanna?"

Roxas looked down at his hole one last time, then got up. Learning how to do the monkey bars couldn't be that hard, especially if an older kid was going to teach him. Axel was sure nice, and he would finally be able to do something even Sora couldn't do. That would be so cool!

The rest of the afternoon, Roxas learned how to swing back and forth across the monkey bars with Axel. The red head wouldn't let him do the really tall ones, saying that if he had to catch him from there that he'd be squished. Roxas didn't really want Axel to be squished, so he agreed reluctantly to stay on the smaller ones. At first, Roxas couldn't really stay up for very long. Axel helped him by cheering him on and showing him how, and before long he could make it all of the way across.

All too soon, a tall, red-headed man that turned out to be Axel's dad showed up to take the boy home. Roxas sadly said bye, not wanting to part with his new found friend so soon. Axel promised to play with him again, though, since he only lived a few blocks away from the park. Roxas happily agreed, forcing the older boy to promise on a pinky-swear. After Axel left, the blond wandered around the park alone until his brother found him. Roxas refused to talk to Sora for the full five minutes it took to walk home before letting his brother know what he had done in his absence. Sora didn't believe that Roxas could do the monkey bars, so Roxas told him that the next time they went, he would prove it.

A couple weeks later, on a day when the cement of the sidewalk was almost hot enough to fry an egg, one certain blond boy sat alone on the swings in the small park down the street. He didn't sit alone very long, though, because a certain red-headed boy soon took the younger boy's hand and raced him over to the slides.

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**Ending Notes:** Drabbles are fun, aren't they? Drop me a review if you have any feedback. Reviews are what let me know if I'm worth anything as an author, but since this is just a short little snippet of a piece of writing, I won't really mind if I don't get much on it. 

**Reviews are subsistence to an author. You don't want me to starve, do you?**


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